BOTTOM LINE: Entertaining and fun with some slick action sequences, “Kick-Ass” bring a real ‘kick’ to the superhero genre to pardon the pun, although the profanity and violence employed by the child characters may offend some who cannot see the humour in it.

THE GOOD: Superhero movies have been done to death with seemingly just about every comic book getting its own film these days. In this sense “Kick-Ass” is no different, however, the feisty and witty nature of the characters and story, not to mention that the heroes in this case are teenagers at their oldest who manage to inflict some violent harm and swear profusely make this a different kettle of fish altogether. Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson) is a geek who wonders why no one has tried to be a superhero given all the publicity afforded these heroes in the fictional universe. He decides to try and be one with surprising results. Despite almost getting killed in his first attempt to defeat bad guys, he quickly develops an internet following as ‘Kick-Ass’ and finally gets the girl of his dreams Katie (Lyndsy Fonseca), albeit in a round-about way. However, he quickly becomes embroiled in a fight with crime boss Frank D’Amico (Mark Strong) and discovers that there are other superheroes out there, but ones who actually know what they are doing. Much fun is had with the character of Dave, as well as his interactions with other superheroes Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage) and Hit Girl (Chloe Moretz), with the latter just about stealing the show with her action-packed, no nonsense character that manages in the end to demolish most of D’Amico’s goons in a fantastic finale, albeit with the help of Kick-Ass. The action sequences in this film are top notch, and are arguably better than what you would see in a $200 million superhero film, despite the fact that this film came nowhere near to costing that much. “Kick-Ass” is a feisty, action packed fun ride that manages to show up many films of its ilk.

THE BAD: The film has generated controversy, particularly with the 11-year old character of Hit Girl, for its use of profanity and violence. I can see that some people might be offended by what they see in this film, but then, they are probably missing the point. If anything, the film seems to be satirising this aspect of our culture of a rowdy youth influenced by these things in our society. One excellent example is when Hit Girl uses night vision goggles to take out D’Amico’s bad guys in one particular scene. As we see her point of view, it feels like a first-person shooter game which seems to mirror the game playing of a lot of kids of violent video games. However, people who cannot see in to these things in the film will just write it off as a disgusting and reprehensible film which is a shame because the film is a lot of fun and reflects aspects about youth, culture, violence and yes, profanity in society.